1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a system, such as a home server, for providing multimedia data to multiple users and multiple devices, and, in particular, to a content reproducing method and apparatus for allowing another device to continuously reproduce content being streamed by a home server.
2. Description of the Related Art
A multimedia broadcasting system for providing multimedia data to multiple users and multiple devices generally includes a home server for streaming multimedia data and at least one client for receiving and reproducing the multimedia data being streamed by the home server. Such a multimedia broadcasting system can be configured by using a Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) protocol. In this case, the UPnP protocol is used to inform a location of a host in a local network or allow the use of a device. In the case of the use of the UPnP protocol, each device (i.e., client) can know only an IP address of a server providing a service, knowledge of the actual physical location of the server by the client is not required.
Devices receiving multimedia content can perform communication between each other by local area communication. The local area communication can use a communication scheme, such as ZigBee, Bluetooth®, infrared communication, or optical communication. For local area communication, an operation, such as a Personal Identification Number (PIN) code exchange, of detecting locations of devices is required for interaction between the devices.
Generally, each client in such a multimedia content providing system has location information of a server but does not have information regarding other clients. Additionally, since conventional location information is information based on a network, it cannot express a device in an actual physical space, and an additional process for exchanging location information between devices, such as a PIN code exchange in Bluetooth®, is required for communication between the devices.